Democrats get their woman against McConnell

Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes made her bid official on Monday, with the Democrat announcing she’ll challenge Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell in 2014.

Democratic Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes announces that she will be making a run at Republican Mitch McConnell's Senate seat in 2014. Grimes stated during her announcement that Kentucky is tired of McConnell over "quadrupling his own net worth" while voting against raising the minimum wage.

Grimes, the youngest female secretary of state in the country, enters the race after actress Ashley Judd passed on the race after a public flirtation.

For Democrats who face a daunting Senate map that puts them in a considerable defensive crouch, Kentucky is now their best offensive opportunity: Grimes decision finally gives them a top recruit against the Republican McConnell, who faces dwindling approval ratings and a lukewarm reception among conservatives.

After informing supporters of her decision, Grimes held a short press conference that began over 30 minutes late outside her former campaign headquarters in Frankfort to announce her decision she’d been weighing for weeks after being courted by national Democrats.

Grimes said she made her decision to enter the race after supporters across the state urged her to jump into the race, but cautioned that the nearly three months she pondered her next move was “due dilligence,” not “hesitancy” on her part.

“I agree with thousands of Kentuckians that Kentucky is tired of 28 years of obstruction, that Kentucky is tired of someone who has voted against raising the minimum wage while quadrupling his own net worth,” said Grimes.

Grimes, a 34 year-old attorney who was first elected Secretary of State in 2011, comes from a political family in the Bluegrass State. Her father, Jerry Lundergan, is a former chairman of the state Democratic party, and was close with former President Bill Clinton, who reportedly urged Grimes to jump into the race.

Acknowledging she begins the race at a disadvantage, Grimes said she was an underdog in her 2011 statewide campaign, after defeating an appointed Democrat for the seat in the primary and went on to win with 60% of the vote in November.

McConnell, armed with an $8.6 million war chest, has already been criticizing Grimes, painting her as national Democrats’ lackey, and a pro-McConnell super PAC has already begun airing ads on his behalf.

But Grimes said those ads from McConnell were “based out of fear of losing his 30 year grip on power.”

And though she’s running in a state where President Obama got just 38 percent of the vote in 2012, she framed this as a choice against McConnell rather than one against the president.

“This Kentucky woman does not believe that the voters of Kentucky will be fooled that easily. We cannot change who our president is, but we can change who represents us in Washington,” she said.

Democrats believe Grimes will be able to bring big money to the race, and outside groups have already been licking their chops for a fight against the Senate minority leader, spending to hit McConnell even without a candidate in place. . But the combative McConnell has hardly been shirking from the fight. And after Grimes’ announcement, national Republicans tied the new candidate to Obama.

“Just last year, Alison Lundergan Grimes stood proudly at the Democratic National Convention to nominate Barack Obama, who has followed through on his promise to destroy the coal industry; in essence declared a war on the state of Kentucky and the middle class families who call it home,” National Republican Senatorial Committee Executive Director Rob Collins said in a statement. “Kentuckians have absolutely no reason to send Alison Lundergan Grimes to Washington to help pass the policies of a president whom they adamantly oppose and to elect a liberal Senate Leader who declared, 'coal makes us sick.'"